10.16. 100. 244 Guide

"Check the Array’s own logs for 10:16 UTC," she said. Leo’s face went pale. "That’s… now. The message arrived the same second we received it. No propagation delay. It didn’t come from space, Mira. It came through the Array—as if something used our own dish to talk to us."

It was 10:16 PM when the message appeared on the technician’s screen: 100. 244. 10.16. 100. 244

"Leo," she said quietly, "start the evacuation protocol." "Check the Array’s own logs for 10:16 UTC," she said

She looked at the numbers one last time. They weren't a message anymore. They were a key. The message arrived the same second we received it

"Run it through the standard filters," she told her junior, Leo. He tapped away, frowning. "No source. No reflection pattern. It’s like the signal started inside the mainframe itself."

"Why? What is it?"

She opened a starchart. 100 hours of arc. 244 degrees. A line of sight pointing not outward, but back toward Earth. Toward the buried salt flat beneath them. Toward something that had been asleep for millennia—until 10:16 PM.